Maybe they would. Maybe a moral couple would do that too, if they thought it was a better choice for the child. I work in the field of disability services (the “caring profession” as we like to call it :)), and it’s not unusual at all to see children given up t be wards of the state by parents who are not immoral or amoral but simply recognize that their child can get better care from professionals than from themselves.
Not necessarily.
What does immorality/amorality have to do with theism/atheism, by the way?
I don’t see how that follows. There are other motivations for altruistic behavior besides fear and guilt.
Okay, I realize that the invalid in question is just being used as a rhetorical prop to fuel the discussion about religion. But still…
…It’s interesting that this discussion is framed around religion at all. The religious periodical cited above certainly emphasizes the family’s faith, but you could easily discuss a number of other factors.
“Would they still take care of their son if they were a different ethnicity?”
“Would they still take care of their son if they were a different generation?”
“Would they still take care of their son if they were rich?”
“Would they still take care of their son if they lived in Canada?”
Did this discussion get framed around religion because of the nature of the online newspaper? Or because of the crucifix hanging above the man’s bed in the picture? Or because the OP thinks they’re hispanic (I hope that was mentioned in the other article, because it certainly wasn’t mentioned in this one)? Or because they live in a “red state”? (I currently live 9.2 miles from the church these people attend every Sunday. They live in Overland Park, Kansas, a gigantic suburb of Kansas City.)
I fail to see how you got a disdain for human love from the quote you responded to.
Drawing erroneous conclusions about what going on inside someone else and then spouting your opinion as if it’s fact is pretty insulting too.
I guess the point I’m trying to get across in my OP is that it might be easier to endure the stresses associated with caring for a profoundly disabled child in a faith-observant environment, which is the choice the Reye family made back in the 50’s.
Would it have occurred as readily in the 80’s, 90’s or today under different conditions, many of which you have already mentioned. You can’t dispute the power of faith in influencing peoples decisions, and guilt is a component.
A truly amoral person wouldn’t even consider what was the right thing to do, so guilt (or at least, feelings of guilt on the part of the amoral person) wouldn’t enter into it at all.
Or it might make it harder, depending on the faith in question. Someone who had faith that his problems were due to sins by his parents and that he was God’s punishment inflicted upon them might come to hate him very quickly. Someone who had faith that it’s the afterlife that matters and not this life might have just killed him to “send him to heaven” as fast as possible. Someone who had faith that one’s status in this world is God’s will and any misfortune that happens to you is deserved might just shove him onto the street under the believe that God will provide if he actually deserves it. Someone who had enough faith in one of the more bloodthirsty older religions might have just sacrificed him on an altar to make their god/goddess happy. Faith and nobility are not the same thing.
I don’t recall ever attending any seminars by this “Satan”. Perhaps you can direct me to a place where I might find this Satan… or also, this God that you speak of. I would like to hear about these universals and assurances that you speak of first hand. Then I’d like for you to demonstrate how belief in this God makes one a more dedicated parent, as you’ve stated in an earlier post. Feel free to include cites to scientific studies that illustrate your point. At the very least demonstrate your point without a reliance on faith as the backbone of your argument.
Perhaps Newt Gingrich’s faith made caring for his wife with cancer easier. Wait - he divorced her for another woman.
These people made the decision they did for their own reasons. They said faith helped, another couple could say that their love for their child helped. As far as I can tell, your single example doesn’t show anything.
I don’t need to speculate on what’s going on in kanicbird’s head when it’s being laid out here for me.
I read this particular spouting of opinion to mean “I think that unless you follow Christ you are a tool of the enemy.” Of course, that doesn’t actually mean anything, but as a belief it doesn’t exactly resonate with respect for parental love either.
You do realize that two of the major messages of Christ is to love God, then to love each other.
A basic understanding of some fundamentals of scripture would help your understanding greatly (in so many ways). Christ came to save the sinner, to deliver them from the evil one. Christ wants us to spread His love so more people can be delivered. So it is quite the opposite, Christan love is given to the non-believer to help him get free from the evil one. And Christians will be judged by how they treat others, including their enemies.
You’re reading into it what is not there. Only you know why.
Sin and guilt are presented as the tools of the enemy. If you have neither then I’m really happy for you. {but mostly skeptical}
I’ve met some Christians who do seem to marginalize forms of love other than God’s love, or “Christian” love as if anything else was an inferior brand name. I do find that insulting. I didn’t see that here.
If you’re going to cherry pick, fine. Christ was a marvelous teacher and had a lot of very good things to say. But in addition to those two very fine messages, Christ called on his flock to be observant of the letter of the old testament law (Mathew 5:18-19), and I’m sure you’re already very familiar with Deuteronomy and Leviticus.
That explains 2 Thessalonians 1:6-9:
“…when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance upon those who do not know God and upon those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They shall suffer the punishment of eternal destruction…” etc.
kanicbird, I apologize for the original attack. You seem to be a thoughtful, moderate person. But as much consideration as I’m sure you’ve given to your faith, and as much as you want to benefit from the message of love that Christ surely brought, when you impute evil to those who don’t agree with your personal convictions then you destroy all of the goodwill you set out to spread.
But is it possible that their “faith” helped by giving them just a tad more ‘strength’ to go on caring for their son?
Consider: They love their son. (Genetics. Can’t help that.) Seeing thier child as a human vegetable must be painful.
Caring for him does not bring the same level of joy as would a non-mentally disabled might. (They can’t romp around the yard with him. They can’t share or experience the child’s wonderment at discovering things in the world. “Ooo! Pretty butterfly!”) They could have sunk into despair, and rationalised that it would have been better to euthanise the kid, and put him out of his suffering.
But they didn’t, they soldiered on. Did some of this ‘strength’ come from faith? If so, is this a bad thing?
You put your faith in science, which is the study of the creation, not the Creator. Just because science can’t prove that there is a ‘God’ does not mean that there is no ‘God’, making that jump would be violating one of the fundamental principals of the very science you have places your faith in.
God proves Himself to people on a personal level. Or to put it another way, what kind of God would want us to able to prove He exists scientifically? We would then just be a bunch of slaves serving God because there He is, the creator of everything.
The God you are expecting to find is the one who wants a house built, and creates a bunch of beings and tells them what to build and where. The God as I have come to know doesn’t operate like that, When He would like a house built, He creates people with free will to decide for themselves if a God exists simply by looking at the creation, and when some of the people conclude that there must be a God, the build Him a house out of love for the Creator.
It is not a cherry pick - is’t a summary, Jesus said that Love of God comes first, and also said if you love God keep His commandments. As for the harsh punishments stated out in the OT, Jesus said you without sin cast the first stone, so it’s not our place to punish one for one’s sin, until the one without sin does so first. God also said vengeance is mine, I will repay. Another central theme is that your will be judged on how you treat others. All the above I can cite the scripture for exact words chapter and verse if you want.
This is about the end times, It sounds like the ones who will be sealed with the mark of the beast in Revelation, at which time there is no going back - they have chosen (either through selecting it or being deceived) what side they will be on, and this is the second coming of Christ who will conquer the earth (and whatever other planets we have set up by then), and set up his kingdom here.
The goal is to show people the love of Christ before this choice has to be made and they are locked out. Now this message has been abused in the past, forcing people to believe at gun or sword point, but again there is no time that Jesus forces people to believe under force, actually for the people who don’t believe he just walks away and goes into another town.
Ok I Hear you, saying that you are serving Satan probably is not the way to get someone to look at the option to serve Christ.
Thats nice, but you didn’t respond to a damn thing I actually wrote. Not a single one. Nowhere in there did you justify your belief that religious, and in particular Xian, parents are more devoted to their children. Nor did you give any reasoning as to your thought process for coming to this conclusion without relying on personal faith.
I’m sure some of their strength is because of their faith, but that’s not what the OP was asking about. He was asking if an atheist couple would have been able to demonstrate the same level of strength.
The answer is yes. People draw strength from a variety of sources. It’s possible to have a very strong moral center without religion. It’s also possible to be deeply religious and be a horrible human being.
The fact that SOME people SOMETIMES find religion to be a useful organizing principle for their lives does not prove that belief is useful in all circumstances.
OK, before I reconsider how to let nonbelievers know they are serving Satan, lets go into this:
Parent child bond is very strong all by itself and normally I don’t expect parents to ask for it to be strengthened, so on the face of it, a believer and nonbeliever bond to their children is not strengthened supernaturally by their faith because they did not ask for it.
Believers can ask God for it to be strengthened and if done according to the way in scripture God promises to make it so. There is no scriptural support for someone without faith getting such a ‘favor’ from God.
BUT…
We have the other side of the coin.
Satan has the ability to also perform supernatural acts on this earth, and should be able to strengthen this bond as well. How does one ask Satan for help, well IMHO anything you rely on that is not of God is of Satan. Why would Satan help? Satan can preform acts for both believers and non-believers and wants you to conclude that God’s word is not the way, whatever you are using is and lead you away from God. Does Satan care if you don’t acknowledge him? No his goal is to lead you away from God, that’s all that’s required.